It was an impressive display of presenting a unified front at Bev Facey High School.

Facey recently hosted the Metro Unified Jamboree, welcoming more than 600 visitors from around the province to town for a sporting festival focused on special needs students.

A total of 518 participants supported by 75 coaches attended the event from 29 schools representing Sherwood Park, the Edmonton area, Barrhead, Boyle, Athabasca and Fort McMurray to compete in three sports — basketball, bean bag toss and bocce ball.

Among their number were 39 of Bev Facey’s own special needs participants, accompanied by a further 31 student partner athletes.

Facey Falcons co-athletic director Darren Gauf said the Unified event, which was jointly operated with Metro Athletics and supported by the Alberta Schools’ Athletic Association and Special Olympics, was an unqualified success story.

“It was fantastic,” he said. “Last year was the first year it was held, hosted by Archbishop O’Leary. We went to the meeting last year and they were looking for a host school and I immediately put my hand up to be the hosts, knowing our facilities were perfect for it and that we would have the interest in our school. It just gives our special needs students the opportunity to wear our school colours with pride and be a bigger part of our program. They live to have that Falcon on their chests as well and a lot of those kids are the heartbeat of our school. It was just a way of getting them more involved. It was just a fantastic event. It was a lot of work, but it was 100 per cent worth it.”

The event was well supported by the entire school population with 75 Bev Facey student volunteers providing support for the event — running a BBQ lunch, photo booth, art station, turbo javelin throwing and a popcorn station. Student volunteers also acted as basketball officials and scorekeepers, were marshals for the bean bag toss and bocce ball, as well as provided crews for set-up and take down for the day.

But perhaps the biggest show of support came at the beginning of the day as the entire school body sent their special needs classmates off to the opening ceremony in style.

“We had our athletes and their student partners march through the hallways and the cafeteria on their way to the opening ceremonies and the rest of the school, the entre school, was out to cheer them on like a mini pep rally for them,” Gauf said. “They were walking through and blowing kisses and just thought it was the best thing ever. It was great that way.”

The games kicked off with O Canada being sung by three Facey student representatives: Annika Ribbonleg, Ayden Moxham and Grace Padberg.

Gauf said the Unified program is truly a valuable one.

“It’s a great program and it is really catching on with all of the schools,” he said. “Everybody sees the value in it now. This event last year had just over 200 participants and this year we bumped that total over 500. All of the other schools are understanding how important it is for these kids to get involved is as well.

“Our special needs teachers said that some of the kids were wearing their medals the next day at school and that some of the parents had texted in pictures of their kids sleeping with their medals, so it was totally worth it.”

Sobey’s supported the event by providing all the BBQ food, drinks and supplies for lunch for all participants and volunteers.